Citizenship Education and Diversity

Since the final decade of the 20th century, both national policymakers and international organizations have shown increasing interest in the position and status of citizenship education (sometimes referred to as civics) within school curricula. At the same time, there has been increased debate about multiculturalism and multicultural citizenship, as policymakers have sought to address perceived tensions between the desire to promote social cohesion and the need to recognize ethnic, cultural, social, and linguistic diversity within the nation-state. Such trends can be identified in education policy making, both in societies that have readily acknowledged their cultural diversity over a long period of time and in those that had hitherto perceived themselves to be homogeneous. Interest in citizenship education and diversity at the national scale has been driven on the one hand by a positive recognition of diversity and dissent as essential elements in the development of a healthy democratic climate and, on the other, by negative associations made between diversity and social cohesion, and latterly with terrorism, particularly since terrorists' attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001.

Interest in citizenship education and diversity has also developed in response to a growing awareness of the importance of learning to live together not only in nations characterized by diversity, but also in local communities and in a global community characterized by diversity. Educators have increasingly given attention to intercultural skills and to the concepts of cosmopolitan and global citizenship in an effort to address diversity at different scales from the local to the global. International organizations such as UNESCO and the Council of Europe have given attention to the global and regional (European) dimensions of citizenship education, exploring ways in which learners might be encouraged to exercise concern and loyalty toward fellow humanity beyond the borders of the nation-state. These developments raise particular challenges for education policymakers and curriculum planners, as pressures to address questions relating to unequal power relations both within communities and nation-states, as well as in international relations, have come to the fore.